A man who beat his pregnant girlfriend so severely that she died of brain damage has been sentenced to 36 years in prison — 16 for killing 21-year-old Monica Sanchez, and 20 for the death of the fetus she was carrying.
Good to know that a born, adult woman’s life is worth 4/5ths of a fetus’s.
Wow. I pretty much want to kill the judge who decided that sentence and then argue that it’s really not so bad because he was already born.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.
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Well she probably deserved to get beat because she is a woman (*note the sarcasm). This pisses me off.
I agree with you that this is grotesque. Some would probably try to argue that the boyfriend should receive less time for killing the woman because he “only” caused damage to her brain (a damage severe enough to lead to her death), wheraes he instantly killed the fetus. But that would be a bullshit argument. For if he didn’t cause the death of the woman, then he didn’t cause the death of the featus either. In fact, he probably didn’t intentionally kill the fetus whereas he intentionally caused his girlfriend severe harm (which led to her death).
What the hell? Did the judge explain what he was thinking?
Some Google sleuthing suggests that the judge’s sentencing may not have been discretionary.
Apparently, once it was determined that Arizona’s “Dangerous Crimes Against Children” statute applied, the death of the fetus had to be punished by either a 20-year sentence or life imprisonment. I haven’t yet found a cite for the minimum/standard sentence for the second-degree murder of an adult.
Inbecredilievable. ‘Potential’ life valued over actual life. That woman was someone’s daughter, about to be someone’s mother, had friends, family and, until it was cut short, she had her own life, theoretically free and unrestrained were it not for the actions of this man. And the foetus? Unborn, unseen, unheard, with no connection to the outside world aside from the woman who was nurturing it and preparing it to live, giving it life with her own. It wasn’t even capable of independent life. And yet, having done nothing in this world aside from existing and growing, it was considered more valuable by the sentence (and, thus, the law) than the woman who was carrying it and preparing it for the future and a life of its own.
Yup — the standard sentence for second-degree murder of a person who isn’t a minor is 16 years. It may be increased or decreased by up to six years on the basis of certain specified mitigating or aggravating circumstances, but apparently the judge didn’t find that any such circumstances applied.
And the Dangerous Crimes Against Children statute explicitly includes “unborn child[ren].”
So to sum up: Arizona law sets out a standard sentence for the murder of a child under twelve that is higher than the standard sentence for an adult. The same law explicitly defines a fetus as a child for the purpose of sentencing. The judge gave Gurrola the standard sentence for both murders.
Holy Shit…seriously. I cannot even describe how much that pisses me off. I would be devestated and angry if someone hurt me and caused the death of my fetus, and I would want them punished for it. That being said, I don’t think that the death of a fetus is somehow worse than the death of the woman carrying said fetus, that’s just repulsive.
Some days I need the wake up call: I really don’t matter to our society unless I harbor some (real) “life” in my innards.
I’ve just erased the all-caps expletive I wanted to use.
Does the Arizona legislature’s thought process make any sense?
If not pregnant, the life of an adult female is “worth” the same as the life of an adult male. (OK)
The life of a child is worth more than the life of a teen or adult. (Longer sentence because killing is more shocking?)
Killing two “lives” is worth more than killing one life. (Simple arithmetic)
Here’s where it breaks down: Life of 7 week embryo = born child (Makes no sense.)
seriously. the guy should’ve only got 16 years.
So we don’t just have one wackjob judge imposing this relative value thing, we have a whole system where pregnant women are defined to be worth less than the feti they carry.
Great. Just fuckin great. Forget Canada, I want to move to Mars.
Hey, at 80% you ladies should stop complaining. it could be worse—the last time we did this to someone they only got only three-fifths.
Well, the judge isn’t wackjob (or he may be, but not as expressed in this decision), it’s the Arizona legislature… you know, the ones that Chuck D had to shame in “By The Time I Get to Arizona” because they couldn’t even pass an MLK Day well into the 90s.
Of course, if the sentence allowable had been “life in prison without parole,” we wouldn’t have to do the whole woman v. fetus mathematical battle to begin with.
This, among many, many other things, is why we are leaving Arizona as soon as we’re done with school.
I really believe the judge and everyone involved in the sentencing was working with the best interests of women and the general public at heart. Like saucysaucy was trying to point out, would you rather the guy just be locked up for 16 years, or would you rather they punished him to the fullest extent that they could, by bringing the Dangerous Crimes Against Children statute into play?
On the other hand, I agree that treating a fetus as a child sets a horrible precedent.
I’m 15 weeks pregnant. While I would be upset if this fetus died, there’s no way it would be anywhere close to the pain of losing a real live person.
And a 7-week embryo? That’s, like, the size of a lima bean. Not a child.
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